[BickNowstrom]

3-4 days after John Hopkins started tracking and the number of infected was still below that of SARS 2003, but exponentially curved upwards. The WHO increased the threat level, but lacked confidence to declare international emergency.

Then in the same speech where they say, they will be fighting a misinformation pandemic, they say nobody outside of China has died, when a Thai national had died in Kolkuta.

All countries complained about the data sharing from China, but when asked, the WHO replied with praise and that it was not time to point any fingers.

Their main concern was for countries with a weak healthcare system, while Italy has the second-best healthcare system of Europe, and India and Africa seem better of.

> they declared it when it reached the criteria to do so.

A pandemic is defined as: "an epidemic occurring worldwide, or over a very wide area, crossing international boundaries and usually affecting a large number of people." The fact was that it's an epidemic in China, Italy, South Korea, and Iran, and it is occurring in more than 80 countries, with some devastating effects. Public health experts were all talking of a pandemic correctly, while Ghebreyesus was still doing "an ongoing assessment" before making a decision.

[simonh]

We're arguing about a couple of days here. All the information they had in January was widely distributed and available to medical professionals worldwide. They were advising aggressive containment and isolation methods in the first declaration of the international emergency.

Really, this is the level we're sinking to? The first death in India was on 12 March. The Thai case was not Coronavirus according to the hospital that treated her, she was tested negative and had been in India since November [0]. If you're aware of the case, surely you must know this?

[0]https://www.theweek.in/news/india/2020/01/28/no-chance-thai-...